Business English: Essential Communication Skills

How to reach a higher level of understanding and usage of English in business settings using free online resources

By Phillip Martin Micallef

Several times during my on and off, 17 year love affair with teaching Business English and training adult professionals, students have asked me how they can improve and reach the higher level of English proficiency required for business situations. I have also been asked how learners can become independent and autonomous after taking an English language course.

There's only so much you can learn on a standard language course. Furthermore, the majority of language schools worldwide are prisoners of their own processes and administration set ups, leaving little room for creativity and genuine business situations and interactions.

Let's start with the course books that are used in most English Language Schools to instruct Business English to adult professionals: THEY ARE ALL OUTDATED, every single one of them. They do not focus on the real developments in the world of business; instead they focus on a syllabus that is designed to pass a professional (ESL) test or to satisfy general demand of their students. Not all learners need this. These course books tend to focus on standard situations, very often out of sync with the real developments in the business world. These books would have been in print for 2 or 3 years if not longer. That is TOO old for today's business professionals. The language needs to be compatible with the current business situations. However, this can easily be countered by using online material instead of general business English course books.

There are so many free, online resources which anyone can avail themselves of. You Tube contains hundreds of English lessons, specialised Business English Lessons, discussions and most importantly; REAL LIFE Business situations that can be invaluable to students of English. There are many professional English language teaching/learning websites where one can practice any of the 4 skills of Listening, Speaking, Writing and Reading complete with self-testing exercises for all levels.

There are some additional steps you can take to further improve your level of Business English and English in general. These methods are fun, realistic and offer a wealth of language learning opportunities.

Take a One to One Course or Private Lessons - the additional investment is worth its weight in gold as there is no faster way to learn than this. Many teachers offer independent private lessons with very competitive pricing. It doesn't have to cost a fortune.

Classroom settings are great as they promote interaction between students, but NOTHING is better than having a teacher cater to your exact needs and NOTHING is better than individual attention if you want to learn English as fast as possible and your time is limited.

The topics HAVE to be relevant and current. You may need to prepare for an important Negotiation, Meeting, Conference Call or Presentation; why not ask your teacher to help you prepare for them? It cannot get more specific than that! Maybe you need to understand a report or file contents? Your teacher can help you with this too. Or a legal document or contract? A good business English teacher should be flexible enough to go into any current business subject matter and pass on this knowledge to the learner.

You need to work on Speed of Delivery (language). You can only learn this by speaking to a NATIVE English speaker who also has a background in business, otherwise it will be impossible to discuss with honesty and subsequently realistically. So you need to work on your flow and speed of delivery and this can only be practiced One to One and the language practiced at a natural pace.

Your teacher must ALWAYS speak in a natural way otherwise you will not be practicing realistic language or situations. You need to train yourself to understand and use the English language at a natural pace; otherwise you will never master the language properly.

Listen, Listen and Listen more

This undervalued English language skill is sadly, not given enough importance. Proof is that most students do worst in this skill during examinations - so statistics support this.

There really is no excuse not to improve this skill with the wealth of freely accessible resources available online today. Furthermore, in the 'real' business world, listening is a very important skill that needs to be mastered in order to reach that higher level of language usage.

There are many practical ways you can practice this skill. Starting off with....

Recording yourself
Yes, recording yourself. These days, almost everyone has a smartphone and all smartphones have a microphone with a record function. USE IT. Test yourself. A simple way to improve your listening and speaking (pronunciation) concurrently is to listen to an audiobook with headphones, record yourself on your smartphone whilst reading the text of the story or book simultaneously. Then listen to your recording and compare it to the original. It is a sure fire way to improve your listening and speaking skills in English. You can even do this watching a film if you have the film dialogue script, and you can probably find that with an online search.

Record a meeting. But always ask permission first. You can then listen back at your leisure in order to understand more comprehensively. Take notes to solidify understanding. Transcribe the meeting whilst listening and read back to yourself. This will solidify understanding. Summarise the main points of the meeting. Listen out carefully for words that can change the entire meaning of a sentence.

Learn regional accents and phrases. This makes more sense than you think. Imagine doing business with an Indian company. The variety (accents, phrases, idioms), is different from British or American varieties of English. Learning and becoming familiar with these accents and regional phrases can give you an edge. It also displays a better understanding of the English language and one of the factors that can elevate the speaker to high proficient level.

Understand sarcasm, slang, colloquial expressions, tone of voice and body language - using them correctly will give you the edge in a business situation. Sometimes people say one thing but mean another! You need to be able to identify this. Being aware of, and able to identify these nuances will ensure you miss nothing about what is being said. However, be very careful using the above unless you are absolutely sure how and when to use them.

Learn how to read Financial Reports and documents. This includes basic legal terminology in relation to business. There are many phrases used constantly in the field of finance and business in general. Once again, it is possible to do this using free, online resources such as specialised English language learning websites, especially those that offer Business English topics.

Check out this link for all specialised, business English topics: www.investopedia.com you will find a free data bank of vocabulary and phrases for every business situation. You can also find good examples of Formal business writing such as; emails, reports, proposals and sales pitches.

In order to improve your understanding of the language used in Financial reports, all one has to do is go to the website of any public corporation where you will find links to the financial reports and accounts, as by law, public corporations are obliged to keep these public records available.

Understanding Economics and Marketing terminology, how the markets work, statistics, charts, graphs, info graphics and numerals are also of great importance in the business world and need to be practiced.

About Me:
I have spent 17 years teaching Business English with 4 of the leading English language schools in Malta: The European Centre of English Language Studies (E.C.), The European School of English (ESE), The Institute of English Language Studies (I.E.L.S./L.A.L.) and Chamber College. I also teach independently to private/corporate clients. I am CELTA (Cambridge University) qualified and I am proud of the recommendations I have received from my clients which are displayed on my LinkedIn profile. I am a native English speaker and British passport holder.

Copyright Protected / P.M.Micallef
Published: Linkedin Pulse June 2016
Tel: +356 9988 7901
[email protected]